In machinery which produces, for example, plastic containers or bags, these bags must be transported and stored in an orderly manner for subsequent delivery to a bag filling machine or the like. The supply of empty bags to the bag filling machine must take place in synchronism with the operating cycle of the filling machine which requires that the bags be delivered at uniform distances and in precisely aligned positions.
Known in the art are methods which require a relatively significant degree of manual labor for collecting bags in intermediate stations and the like. These methods suffer from the obvious disadvantages of such required manual intervention. Also known from the German Offenlegungsschrift No. 26 34 216 is a method for storing, transporting and distributing individual flat objects, in particular plastic bags. In this known method, the bags are correctly positioned and are laid in overlapping manner on a carrier web. A second covering web is applied continuously to the tops of the bags for the purpose of fixing their relative position. The two carrier webs including the bags held between them are then wound up on a storage roll.
The use of two separate carrier belts entails a relatively high expense. Furthermore, the position of the bags or the flat objects held between two carrier webs is not secure enough to prevent mutual displacement or rotation of the objects which can lead to great difficulties when these objects are delivered to a subsequent machine for further processing. Still another disadvantage of the known method is that it is not possible to store the belts and the objects or bags held therebetween in any manner except on a storage roll or spool. In particular it is not possible to store the belts in a flat folded (zig-zag) configuration within a box because the belts would then cease to hold the bags or objects in their correct position which would defeat their purpose.